As economic uncertainty continues to rule the airwaves, most if not all companies are experiencing a challenging sales year. As if selling is not already difficult enough, the current “low demand” environment amplifies many of the typical selling challenges, including:

• Stimulating interest and differentiating
• Demonstrating compelling value
• Effectively mining existing customer relationships
• Moving the customer conversation from commodity products to high-value solutions
• Doing more with less across the board

The instinctive response in this scenario can be, like a panicked army, the tendency to attack anything that moves. Sometimes this activity-intensive behavior is defended under the guise of being “entrepreneurial”, but the ensuing chaos rarely produces consistent execution (or results).

Like other forms of crisis, the most difficult times are precisely when clear thinking and discipline are most critical. Taking a rational, well-defined approach to targeting prospects, account planning, and sales execution are more important than ever for sales organizations. In other words, truly understanding and implementing a sales process (and “how to” methodologies) is potentially the best economic insurance policy your company can invest in.

The Cold Hard Facts About Process
But how can you make this case with confidence? In short, the cold facts at two distinct levels support the compelling economics of successful process adoption. What does research tell us about this topic? First, let’s consider the findings at an aggregate level. For the past 13 years, CSO Insights has conducted an annual sales performance study of more than a thousand global companies. For the relatively small number of companies who have attained world-class levels of sales process adherence (by CSO Insight’s criteria), the outcomes are nothing short of compelling. These companies on average realize the following advantages over their peers:

• 11.6% higher quota attainment
• 3.5% improvement in win rates of forecasted deals
• 30% reduction in turnover
• 185% improvement in cross selling and up selling
• 143% improvement in selling value and avoiding excessive discounting

But what about results at the individual company level? Many case studies that are presented at this level are often anecdotal, or fail to demonstrate a “cause and effect” relationship that is valid. That is, they fail to tie specific changes in seller behavior to a defined set of sales outcomes. Several studies have been independently performed by SPI clients to determine how the application of specific methods in the Solution Selling process correlates to key sales metrics. These analyses considered key elements of sellers executing the process, including the degree to which:

• the customer problem (pain) was identified
• reasons for the customer problem were understood
• specific organizational impact of the problem was understood
• buying influence was established
• access to power was established
• proof of value was established

As one might expect, there was a consistent pattern of positive and statistically valid correlations to key sales metrics, including:

• More qualified opportunities generated
• Higher quality (larger) opportunities generated
• Shorter sales cycles
• Higher win rates
• More consistency (predictability) of win rates

In other words, just as consistent diet and exercise almost guarantee improved health, the salespeople who most consistently adhered to the Solution Selling process improved sales outcomes in almost all areas.

The Process Challenge
If the rewards are so compelling, why don’t more companies invest in the development and adherence to a sales process? According to research by CSO Insights, only 14% of the companies in their annual study have evolved to a world class (Level 4 in their model) of sales process maturity. There are a number of potential reasons:

1. Ignorance and misconceptions - The term “sales process” has a superficial connotation in many cases. Often companies believe that having a CRM system with sales milestones and probabilities is equivalent to having a sales process. There is typically little analysis of buyer behavior, methodology (how to’s) integration, messaging and sales tool integration, and management system and metrics implementation. In addition, many organizations fail to incorporate critical targeting and account planning methods into the overall selling process.
2. Product-focused sales training - Product training continues to dominate the sales training spend, without integrated skills training. It is often left to the salesperson to “connect the dots” between product training and skills training.
3. Skills training without process integration -When companies do invest in skills (methods) training, it is often event-based, and not aligned with a well-defined sales process. In this scenario, research shows that salespeople retain less that 15% of the training content.
4. Sales culture = “cowboy” culture - Lone wolf sales stars may tend to rebel with respect to process initiatives. Top performers may discount the necessity of process, and label it as a “big brother” intrusion or waste of their valuable time - giving process a bad name. However, research has indicated that mid-level performers (the bulk of the sales force), can benefit significantly from process adherence and effective (process-based) coaching.
5. Management Attention Deficit Disorder - Sales executives are under intense pressure to meet short-term targets. Process initiatives can appear complex, and can evoke responses such as “it’s hard to fix the plane while we’re flying.” Without strong executive sponsorship or visionary leadership, it is often hard to obtain the mindshare necessary to effect real change.

The Good News
In spite of these challenges, process-based selling is quite feasible for most sales organizations if they make a modest investment to understand their current state, and take a stepwise approach to steady performance improvement (just like diet and exercise). What is missing in the “noise of battle” for most organizationsis a practical model (blueprint) for understanding where you are today, and a logical implementation plan (roadmap) to make incremental improvements that are sustainable.